


Bet on it

by Farashe



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-09
Updated: 2016-04-09
Packaged: 2018-06-01 03:30:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6499072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Farashe/pseuds/Farashe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before the battle at Ostagar, the Wardens are taking bets, and Alistair discovers he's become more than a little attached to a specific new recruit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bet on it

“Alistair! There you are!”

Alistair looked over at whoever was calling him and saw a group of fellow Wardens gathered around a fire. They looked relaxed and several were chuckling. Alistair smiled back cautiously. For all he knew, he was the butt of the current joke.

“Yes?” he asked.

“Back from babysitting the recruits, are you?” asked one Warden.

Alistair shrugged. “They weren’t so bad.” And one of them, he thought privately, was actually rather lovely.

“Good! Then you have a feel for them and can help us.”

Alistair approached the group and sat down. He had a few minutes before Duncan would need him for the actual Joining ritual. “Help you with what?”

“Well,” piped up another of the Wardens, “we’re wagering on which ones we’ll be calling brother. I’m putting my sovereigns on the thief. The scrappy ones seem to have a better chance.”

“You’re betting on who will live?” Alistair’s stomach twisted. He was surprised at the intensity of his own revulsion.

“Or who will die. Either way. So? What do you think? Insider’s opinion on who’s got that special Warden spice?”

Alistair looked at all the faces grinning back at him expectantly, but he found he couldn’t join in the fun this time. He thought about each of those recruits he had just shepherded through the Wilds. Ok, so he didn’t like Jory much but the man seemed decent enough and obviously loved his wife, and Daveth was a trickster but he seemed to take the Blight more seriously than anything else in his life, and Elissa, she… Well, she was beautiful and competent and there was grief in her eyes that he longed to ease. If she died in the Joining…

“I can’t,” he said more harshly than intended, but he really couldn’t help it. “You’ll have to profit from their lives or deaths without me.” With that he stalked off to meet with Duncan and the recruits for the ritual.

He heard a dismissive snort from one of the Wardens behind him. “The pretty noble must have caught his fancy. Poor boy. That will end in tears. His tears. I’d bet on it.”

“Oh? How much?” And then, Alistair was, thankfully, out of earshot.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been replaying Origins. I haven't replayed since just before Inquisition came out so it's been really great to experience everything again. So many feelings. Seriously Origins has such a fantastic story.
> 
> Anyway, as I was playing, I thought about the Wardens at Ostagar and what they were thinking about getting some new recruits and this happened. Very shot, but I wrote it during the ten minutes I was eating lunch at work today.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!


End file.
